June 9, 2012 12:34 pm

A key lime flavored cupcake from Wanna Cupcake?, which just opened a retail bakery in Puyallup.

Here’s the story of another business that’s made the move from a Farmers Market vendor to a brick-and-mortar business. Last year, Wanna Cupcake? started selling at the Puyallup Farmers Market. They collected such a following, they opened a small cupcake bakery on Main Street near downtown Puyallup. The bakery’s opening day was Monday.

The bakery is a family project. The owners are Jim and Karie Romano, who live in Bonney Lake with their three children, Adrianna, Andrew and Julia. The cupcakes that Karie baked for Julia’s fourth birthday party gave the couple the idea to turn Karie’s home-baked treats into a business.

Wanna Cupcake changes its menu daily.

They started the business on a micro level, selling to Forza and Champions Centre. The next step was the Puyallup Farmers Market last summer. They rented space on Main Street as a commercial baking location. On Monday, they opened that space to the public as a retail shop (they still do the baking there, too). The cupcake shop is walk-in only, although a few cafe tables are out front, and it’s open Monday through Friday so that the Romanos can continue to sell cupcakes at the Puyallup Farmers Markets on Saturdays and Sundays. The cupcake menu changes daily. Cupcakes are $3 each, with discounts for bulk buying. They also have cake pops and a few other treats at the front counter.

I’ve sampled a handful of cupcakes and found the cupcake bases to be tender yet cakey, not too light, like those too-springy bakery cupcakes that taste straight out of a box. The buttercream frosting is the real deal and I appreciated that the ratio of frosting to cupcake seemed just right. A key lime cupcake – with a puckery lime buttercream and a graham cracker crust on the base – tasted about as close a translation to a key lime pie that a bakery can get into a cupcake. Nicely done.

A coconut lemon gluten-free cupcake from Jubilee Cupcakes in Puyallup.

UPDATE: Jubilee Cupcakes in Puyallup

Speaking of cupcake shops in Puyallup, Jubilee Cupcakes on South HIll recently started selling gluten-free desserts. I stopped in and tried a coconut and lemon gluten-free cupcake and was surprised that it didn’t have the grainy texture that so many gluten-free cakes can carry. A counter worker told me the baker uses a blend of different flours to give the cupcake a lighter lift. I’m a fan. Jubilee also bakes gluten-free sugar cookies, pumpkin bars and a few other gluten-free treats. They’re located at 13333 Meridian Ave. E., next door to the movie theater in the same parking lot where Buffalo Wild Wings will open.